Bless ‘Em, Blame ‘Em – March 15

March 15, 2012 by C.M. Wilcox

It’s a country version of Cheers & Jeers… or Tip of the Hat, Wag of the Finger… with a title derived from Kris Kristofferson’s “Who’s to Bless and Who’s to Blame.”

BLESS…

– Chuck Mead, whose Back At The Quonset Hut mixes the best of honky tonk and old rock ‘n’ roll with help from members of Nashville’s original A-Team of studio musicians and guest spots by Bobby Bare, Jamey Johnson, Elizabeth Cook, and Old Crow Medicine Show.

– CMT.com, which seems to be using its powers for good in the form of two new projects, Concrete Country and CMT Edge. The former is an online performance series that will feature roots artists like the Farewell Drifters, Lydia Loveless, and Jason Boland, while the latter is an upcoming music discovery blog headed up by Craig Shelburne – which, even without further details, would seem to bode well for it being worthwhile.

– Miley Cyrus, who tipped her 5 million Twitter followers off to the excellence of Gretchen Peters’ Hello Cruel World in a series of tweets earlier this week. If the tweets produce a nice sales bump for Peters, I might be willing to forgive Miley for the Hallmark sentimentality of “The Climb.”

BLAME…

– Candidate playlists, which always seem to say more about who a candidate’s courting, and how he’d like to see himself portrayed in the press, than about his actual taste in music. Does anyone really believe that Mitt Romney is singing along to “I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow” on his way to campaign stops? Or that Barack Obama has any particular fondness for “My Town” by Montgomery Gentry?

I’m so glad Chuck Mead is back in the BR5-49 groove on his latest album. Now that is my kind of music! I sure hope it sells better than his last effort as it surely deserves to.

I didn’t realize Craig Shelburne was behind CMT’s new EDGE blog. I really don’t share similar tastes in music with Craig, but at least what he writes is worth reading. Better Craig than Alison Bonaguro…

Oh, I thought Miley was being lauded for her decision to go braless all the time as celebrated at TMZ! (lol)

Not so sure aboout those candidate playlists. The way things are going in the Republican primaries these days, “Man of Constant Sorrow” should be Newt Gingrich’s campaign theme song.